DURHAM, N.H. — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton repeatedly played “the woman card” yesterday, telling tales of the chauvinism that she faced during her college years in the 1960s and demanding that U.S. foreign policy be centered on women’s rights.

Just days after her campaign objected to what they called “piling on” by six male presidential candidates during Tuesday’s Democratic debate in Philadelphia, the New York senator told the mostly female crowd at the University of New Hampshire that women are still subjugated by men.

“When women continue to be raped and trafficked, denied education and family planning, subjected to violence in and out of their homes, that compromises the dignity and humanity of the entire human family,” she said. “We cannot have the kind of foreign policy we need if we don’t put women’s rights at the very top of what we’re trying to achieve.”

The front-runner for the Democratic nomination added a personal touch by telling a story about when she was trying to decide between attending law school at Harvard or Yale.

“I met a man who … was tall and imposing. He had a three-piece suit on and a watch chain,” she said of her visit to Harvard. “This professor looked down at me and said … ‘We don’t need any more women.’ ”

The field house full of young women groaned loudly. “So, obviously I decided to go to Yale,” Mrs. Clinton said to laughter and applause.

She added that when she got to Yale, she was one of 27 women in a class of 235 “and today women are the majority of students in law school.”

“Today we’re breaking down all kinds of glass ceilings and barriers. But the idea of a woman running for president when I was in college would have been greeted with total laughter. Well, times have changed,” the former first lady said.

“In so many ways, this all-women’s college prepared me to compete in the all-boys club of presidential politics,” she said to cheers of support.

Mrs. Clinton chose her old college to announce the formation of “Hillblazers,” her campaign’s new effort to cultivate support nationally among college students.

Colleen Jones-Turner, who brought her 10-year-old daughter Morrigan to the New Hampshire event, said the message that women are capable is still important today.

“Until there’s equality for women, we need to do that, especially for young girls,” Mrs. Jones-Turner said. “She’s going to shatter the glass ceiling.”

But Linda Thompson, 20, said she thinks that ceiling already has been shattered.

“Everyone knows that a woman can be president. They have led countries all over the world, just not here,” she said. “I don’t think women need to be pleading their case.”

Meanwhile in Iowa, Emily’s List, a group that seeks to elect pro-choice Democratic women, said it planned to contact as many as 100,000 women in the state and encourage them to support Mrs. Clinton in Iowa’s caucuses Jan. 3.